New Life Academy track & field: Eagles boys win MCAA championship

The New Life/Bethany Academy track team competed in the seven team MCAA Conference meet on Saturday May 19 at the Richfield High School track. The Eagles boys team came away as MCAA Conference champions with 186 points and West Lutheran finishing in second place (125 points) and the Eagles girls took third place with 112 points. Legacy Christian won the girls meet with 163 points.

New Life Academy senior Dan Otto was named outstanding performer for the boys meet with three first-place and one second-place finish. Otto won the 110-meter hurdles in a time of 15.82 seconds, breaking his own meet record set last year, won the 300-meter hurdles with a 42.22 time and finished in first place in the high jump, clearing 6 feet. Otto also ran a leg of the Eagles 1600-meter relay team that finished in second place.

In addition to Otto’s exploits, New Life’s Sam Dufault had two first-place finishes – in the long jump and in the pole vault, setting a new school record by clearing 9 feet, 8 inches in his first time competing in the event. Dufault also earned two second-place finishes – in the 400-meter dash and as part of the 1600-meter relay team. Also, individually,

Dan Sleper took second place in the 1600-meter run, first in the 3200-meter relay, second in the 1600-meter relay and placed seventh in the triple jump, in his first attempt at the event, while Mark Schreiner helped the Eagles 800-meter relay team take first place and had second-place finishes in the 110 and 300 hurdles, and a fifth-place finish in the high jump.

The Eagles boys team finished first in every relay event with the exception of a close second-place finish in the 1600-meter relay. NLA’s 3200-meter team of Ryan Peterfeso, Dan Sleper, Dan Niemeyer and Sam Hagan took first place with a time of 8 minutes, 50.71 seconds, the Eagles 800-meter relay team of Schreiner, Eby Ketema, Ty Frazier and Kyle Linton earned first place with a time of 1:39.03, the 400-meter relay team of Matt Michaud, Ketema, Frazier and Linton placed first in a time of 47.71 seconds and the 1600-meter team of Sleper, Otto, Hagan and Dufault took second in a time of 3:45.93, just back of Legacy’s 3:45.70.

“The assistant coaches did a great job of preparing the kids in their specialty events and then worked with them to place in the events they normally don’t perform in,” NLA head coach Tim Otto said. “All in all it was a great meet with some outstanding performances. The 3200-meter relay team took 13 seconds off its previous best time. Just about everyone was in four events, it was a great team performance.”

Amy Maslonka helped the youthful Eagles girls team – which has one senior, no juniors and the rest 8th, 9th and 10th graders – finish in third place. Maslonka took first place in the 100-meter dash (13.96), second place in the 200-mter dash (28.39) and anchored the Eagles’ winning 400-meter relay, which – along with Tatiana Lee, Emily Sovine and Alyssa Binion – ran a time of 56.45.

In other relays, Lee, Binion, McKenzie Dufault and Joci Morara took third place in the 800-meter relay, and Gorter, Sarah Olfelt, Rogness and Mortenson finished in third place in the 1600-meter relay.

Also, Sovine finished in third place in the pole vault, Tori Rogness placed third in the 800 and ran on the Eagles third-place 1600-meter relay team, Sydney Mortenson won the 400-meter run (1:05.27) and anchored the 1600-mter relay team, Olfelt placed second in the 1600-meter race, Gorter placed second in the triple jump, long jump and high jump and ran a leg of the 1600-mter relay.

Next, the Eagles will compete in the Section 4A Subsection meet on Thursday, May 24, at St. Croix Lutheran High School.

Tags: track and field, sports, prep, updates